


evensong

by cosmicpoet



Series: shuake week 2019 [4]
Category: Persona 5
Genre: Confessional, First Meetings, Internalized Homophobia, Kissing, M/M, church
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-17 14:47:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21056165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmicpoet/pseuds/cosmicpoet
Summary: Akira, no longer religious, finds himself on the wrong side of a confession.





	evensong

“Ah, yes, perfect, Akira! Hold that pose,” Yusuke frames the scene with his hands and begins sketching. The echo of the church reflects only the slight coughs from Yusuke and the exquisite, marble silence of Akira, allowing himself freely to be the muse for one of his best friends. Hours pass this way, until the light leaks of sundown reflect through the stained glass and Yusuke packs up his art materials, thanking Akira for his patience and telling him that he’ll see him tomorrow.

Alone again, Akira wanders the pews of the church. They broke in shortly after the benediction of evening mass, right in the thick of summer when the sun still had a few hours left in it; right now, things are getting cold again, and he feels more than a little strange to be back in a place that he hasn’t trespassed in since childhood.

He wonders what God thinks of him, now. His mouth feels dry as old communion bread, the memories hard and fast in his chest, sticking in his gut with the guilt that he hasn’t quite managed to overcome - he’s never good, never _been _good, and even a decade since his Holy Communion hasn’t done what time is supposed to do, and _heal. _His early twenties so far have been filled with repression and self-condemnation, to the point that even standing at the altar floods him with a sense of oppression; this place can’t be Holy, not when it provokes such a profound sense of alienation.

Rebellion, the only feeling of comfort he has when navigating the world any more, spurs him to desecrate the confessional, and he sits down where the Priest would usually sit, closing the screen and boxing himself into the alternate side of a role he never wants to play anymore. Even the wood itself feels garish, and Akira pulls a cigarette out of his pocket, lighting it with a smirk, hoping to make his teenage self proud with blasphemy.

He takes a long drag and fills the small booth with smoke, resting his head against the wall and his feet on the bench as he closes his eyes and imagines that Hell won’t be so bad. There’s a sound from behind the screen, and Akira doesn’t straighten himself up or stop smoking - if there’s someone here to arrest him, let them do it, he hopes it will make morning news and be plastered all around his old Catholic school. But there’s nothing apart from quiet shuffling and somebody clearing their throat before speaking.

“Uh, hello,” the voice says, and Akira opens his eyes. He can’t see through the screen, and he stays silent in response. “I don’t really know if there’s anyone in here but… maybe that would be better. I don’t… I don’t really know how to do these things. Uh, I suppose I should just confess?”

Akira takes another drag. This seems interesting. Although his cigarette is right down to the filter already, he uses the final traces of flame to light a second one, wanting to blaspheme as much as he can before he goes back to his small apartment and has to deal with the fact that he exists.

“Well, I… I killed someone.”

Oh.

“I didn’t… I didn’t mean to. You can’t share anything I say in here, right? Yeah, I read that before I came. I don’t really know why I’m here. I… I mean it’s not going to make anything any better, is it? But my father… he told me I had to steal this research off this woman and I… I did, and I thought that’d be it, you know? But she was working on some… some stuff that’s pretty out there and he… he ordered someone to kill her b-but… if I hadn’t… she’d still be… it’s because of _me! _I’m the one who stole her research and got her killed!”

“That’s not true,” Akira finds himself saying.

“W-What? You sound a little… young to be a Priest. Is this some sort of setup?”

“No.”

“How am I supposed to believe you?”

“You smoke?” Akira asks.

“Yes. Why?”

He pulls back the screen just enough that he can’t see this man’s face, passing the cigarette through; he feels that the man is wearing gloves by the way his own hands brush against the fabric, and he barely has time to retract his hand before the man slams the screen door closed again.

“You haven’t seen my face. So there’s nothing you _could _do, even if you wanted to.”

“Which I don’t.”

“Well, you’re obviously not a Priest.”

“You got me there.”

“Why _are _you here?”

“Catholic guilt,” Akira laughs.

“Pathetic.”

“I know, right?”

“Well, I’m leaving. This whole thing was a mistake, including you,” the man says, his voice bitter but emotionless, like he’s not really saying what he means.

“I could just walk out too and see your face.”

“You wouldn’t _dare.”_

“Try me,” Akira smirks, and it’s evident in his voice that he’s enjoying this strange back-and-forth.

“Catholic guilt,” the man muses, “what’s all that about?”

“They don’t tend to look favourably on being gay.”

“Ah, I see. So instead of getting therapy, you hang around churches and smoke in the confessional booths? Does that fix your life?”

“It doesn’t need fixing.”

“Keep telling yourself that,” the man says, and Akira notices that he’s pulling open the screen a little, peeking through to get a good look at Akira’s face without letting his own appearance be seen. Petty, almost childlike retaliation pulls Akira’s hand towards the screen, yanking it open completely and staring down whoever he’s been talking to for the past ten minutes.

He’s… very attractive. Even though he looks like he’s seething with anger, his facial features are soft and the way his light brown hair frames his face, especially in the darkness of the confessional, make him look like he’s been sent straight from some otherworldly, divine plane specifically to make Akira _gayer._

Akira is expecting to be slapped, shouted at, maybe even punched in the face. He’s decidedly _not _expecting for his collar to be grabbed and for the man to almost slam their faces together in a violent kiss - not that he minds, especially when his hands find their way around the man’s tie and pull him even closer. Breathless, they pull away, and Akira looks directly into his eyes, trying to establish some kind of connection between this and reality.

“I’m Akira,” he says.

“You’re not getting my name. You’ve already seen my face.”

“Then what _can _I call you?”

The man thinks for a moment, cupping Akira’s face through the screen; his body is already at a strange angle, and it’s not exactly _comfortable, _but it’s the most alive Akira has felt in years. “You can call me Crow,” the man says.

“Well then, _Crow, _let’s take this outside.”

As Akira exits the confessional, he almost convinces himself that the whole thing was some sort of fever-dream, that he’s going to burst out of the haze of smoke and the stained glass will be staring at him, the altar will be rising with rich wine, and he’ll be damned to Hell on the spot. But he steps through the fog and barely has time to blink himself into recognition before Crow’s hand is holding his arm, pulling him between the pews, his wild eyes saying _chase me, catch me. Pray, pray, pray._

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment if you liked this :)


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